Women Foreign Service officers sue State

June 21, 1993

By CompiledDavid Mutch

Some female Foreign Service officers are asking a federal court to stop the State Department from violating anti-discrimination rulings. The women's motion, filed Friday in US District Court in Washington, seeks a five-year extension of a 1989 injunction forbidding discrimination against female Foreign Service officers and asks individual remedies for women affected by violations. It also accuses Secretary of State Warren Christopher of violating the injunction and seeks to have him held in contempt of c ourt.

The case, originally brought 17 years ago, contended that the State Department was accepting far fewer women than men in the Foreign Service and was discriminating against women in training, assignments, evaluations, and awards.

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